Hi from Kent

[thecornflake]

Hi,

I've just joined, so a quick bit about me. We recently moved to a rented house with a small patio garden that has a narrow flower bed on one side and that's about it. I would ultimatley like to do the whole smallholding thing but due to money/fmaily etc reasons it's still just a dream. In the meantime I plan to try and do as much as I can towards being self sufficient with what I have, mainly by growing my own veg and herbs.

I currently have a plastic tub with a strawberry and pepper plant in it. I also planted some seeds this weekend - carrots, radishes and spinach.

You can see a picture of the garden here - and over to the left behind the kiddy trampoline is the tub with the two plants in it.

Any suggestions on what else to do to make the most of it would be appreciated. I'm thinking about getting a small compost bin and one of those tiny greenhouses to protect the seedlings.

EDIT: That's mint growing in the pot on the fence.

[red]

how much sun do you get?
if its fairly sunny, you sould be able to raise tomatoes ok (bit late though this year) plently of herbs in pots.. and as herbs like drier conditions generally, they will like the pots. you can do some salads in pots too. a sprinkle of rocket seeds in a pot produces enough for a sarnie pretty quickly

anyway hi and welcome!

[thecornflake]

It gets quote a lot of sun, from late morning right round to late afternoon at the moment (if the sun is actually out of course!).

I was thinking of trying tomatoes in grow bags along the wall, but no-one else in the family likes them so it probably isn't worth it.

[red]

if you like them.. go for it! you could do strawberries.. again in baskets (away from the slugs) or pots or growbags. if you got a mini greenhosue thingy - you could look at pepper, chilis, aubergines

[Annpan]

Welcome

I'd go for one of those tall greenhouses with shelves in, it would make best use of the space.
A small compost bin is a must - IMO
Grow what you will use and eat, tomatoes can be made into all sorts of sauces, chutneys and soups (which can be frozen) so they might not be too bad an idea afterall

[thecornflake]

I'd like to do Aubergines, not sure how these would work in a container. I've heard of tumbler tomatoes that can be grown in hanging baskets - anyone got any knowledge of these?

I do make home made pizzas and pasta sauce etc so I think tomatoes would be a good idea, although this would ideally mean plum tomatoes rather than salad ones. Do plum ones grow in the UK ok?

[red]

I grow one called 'inca'from sutton seeds - grown in unheated greenhouse.

[ohareward]

cornflake

I'm a Weetbix person myself.

If your area is planned carefully it is surprising what you can grow in a small space.

Robin

[Andy Hamilton]

I have a North facing concrete back yard in my rented house. A couple of weeks ago I planted out some runner beans, bit late in the day really for them but they are coming on great. All herbs have done well, a stack of potatoes in tyres in fact the only thing that did not work well was a butternut squash plant. I think more because it was in poor soil.

On that back fence you could grow beans and other things that trail up it I would imagine.

Oh and welcome to the forum.

[Millymollymandy]

Hello and welcome!

[Millie]

Hello! Wow, loads of space compared to my garden, and paved too, brilliant for container gardening. All my containers are ex toy boxes and T***o value boxes, which were 97p each, much cheaper than the terracotta plastic troughs etc. I bought 4 x 80l bags of compost, currently on offer at Wickes and got stuck in. I planted some carrots, and then read the packet - says do not plant in compost, will see what happens *shrug*

If it were me, I would have containers round the boundary, and then depending on how sturdy the fence is, pop "window" boxes along all the fences, up nice and high, good use of space. Go mad and grow what you fancy, and look out for seeds in the sale for planting next year :)

[Thomzo]

Hi and welcome
My mother is having a lot of success growing blackberries and other climbing fruit in pots. With all that fence you have loads of space for them to climb and it would soften it up. When you move on you can take them with you.

Cheers
Zoe

[thecornflake]

Hello! Wow, loads of space compared to my garden, and paved too, brilliant for container gardening. All my containers are ex toy boxes and T***o value boxes, which were 97p each, much cheaper than the terracotta plastic troughs etc. I bought 4 x 80l bags of compost, currently on offer at Wickes and got stuck in. I planted some carrots, and then read the packet - says do not plant in compost, will see what happens *shrug*

If it were me, I would have containers round the boundary, and then depending on how sturdy the fence is, pop "window" boxes along all the fences, up nice and high, good use of space. Go mad and grow what you fancy, and look out for seeds in the sale for planting next year :)

It looks a bit bigger than it really is due to the way the photographs have been stitched together, but there is quite a lot of space for containers and climbing things up the fence.

I have some radishes showing which is the first thing to come up from the seeds I planted last weekend so I'm basking in an aura of achievement at the moment. Although I think I may have put a few too many seeds in. I get the feeling the family will be sick of eating radishes pretty soon!

I didn't see anything on the carrot packet about not using compost, I just used standard stuff in the seed trays so I'll see what happens.

[Millie]

T***o value boxes,

So, I can say Wickes but not T***o, can I say Asda?